Monday, May 19, 2008

VSL Hotline: "Limping In" Edition

Bad weekend for Vanderbilt sports, so this will be short and less than sweet. On the baseball front, Florida swept us, coming from behind in all three games to win 8-6, 5-4, and 13-12 in 11 innings on Saturday, leading Brandon Zimmerman of the Gainesville Sun to remark: "If Vanderbilt hopes to have success in the postseason, the Commodores will need to learn how to close out games." The Commies, who now stand at 37-18 (15-14 SEC), have the #6 seed in the double-elimination SEC Tournament and face the Gators again in the first round on Wednesday.

Limping into the tournament off a five-game losing streak is not exactly how you'd draw it up, and all the more disconcerting given that no one -- from Corbin down to the players themselves -- has supplied much of an explanation for why Vanderbilt has been unable to close the door on opponents. Perhaps one of you can assist us with that by chiming in here.

In other news, Jon Curran finished at two-over-par and tied for 58th place at the NCAA East Regional, and women's tennis lost to (who else?) Florida in the Sweet Sixteen of the NCAA Tournament.

On a slightly more uplifting note, Brett Hait has an interesting article in Friday's City Paper about the rise of college basketball in the state of Tennessee, particularly in light of what turned out to be a great recruiting season for Memphis, UT, and Vanderbilt alike.

Finally, I'm pretty excited that All-SEC cornerback D.J. Moore has been named to the preseason watch list for the Bronco Nagurski Trophy, awarded annually to the top defensive player in college football.